Editing Shooting People’s US Screenwriters Bulletin

Pretty late in posting this news here, but better late than…you get it. I have recently been made Editor of the US Screenwriters Network bulletin. This is a newborn from ShootingPeople.org based in the UK. SP has surpassed 20,000 members and is rapidly finding more and more film people joining every day.

Why do they keep doing that? I’ll tell you why I did last year. I got to set up my online card, set up an account, receive daily email bulletins about NY Filmmaking events, and post my own messages on the bulletin…all for FREE. How cool is that!

Anyway, I’ve found many people I went on to work with on my projects from Shooting People. It makes things easier to look for people, projects. It makes sense that the organization would branch out into other divisions, just as they have done in the UK this past 8 years. In UK, SP has separate sections for doc makers, screenwriters, a weekly script pitch bulletin that makes it to 5,000 subscribers, and tons of festival and events info.

Why can’t we do something like that in the US? And so they did. SP has, by the way, patronage from some very well known filmmakers who participate in SP events and support and love the org’s efforts and accomplishments. Mind if I drop a couple of names here?…I didn’t think you would…Albert Maysles, Morgan Spurlock, Danny Boyle, Mike Figgis, Stuart Beattie (a great supporter of the Screenwriters bulletin), and many more.

How did I become the Editor? Very good question. It just happened. One of those fortunate events in life you have no explanation for, but you would be foolish not to embrace it. I’d seen an ad on NY Filmmakers bulletin (the first SP bulletin in US) asking for an editor who would edit/moderate the new launch. To this day I don’t know why I decided to email wonderful Jesse, editor of that bulletin, and ask about what it takes to edit a bulletin like that. Before I knew it, we were talking about the possibility of my editing the new bulletin. I met up with her a couple of times for informal interviews, exchanged email with the founders of SP in the UK…and forward to last week…the first issue of the bulletin.

What made me stand out, apparently, is my writing this blog. So, I should thank the blog and you readers (whisper: who read but never post comments)…yes, I thank you anyway. I would like to say my good looks were thought of as a possible subscription booster and , but that would just be the truth, wouldn’t it. Where’s the fun in that? Now, wait a minute there…that nose job was a gift!

Is this where the pitch enters? Yes, mon ami!

You can join Shooting People for FREEEEEEE by clicking on the title of this post. To receive both bulletins, you just hafta click on the boxes on the HOME page.